Findon man reunited with lost mother

AFTER 56 years, it took just 48 hours during a holiday on a Greek island for a local man to be reunited with his mother.

Peter Knee discovered that his biological mother was still alive and that he had 60 relations he knew nothing about during August.

“Meeting my mother came about through an extraordinary turn of events,” said Peter, of Findon Road, Findon Valley.

The father of two first found out he was adopted when he was aged 10. An inquisitive child, he wanted to know why someone called “Uncle Peter” would send him cards at Christmas.

He said: “I then learned my parents were actually my adoptive parents and ‘Uncle Peter’ was actually my real father.

“It was a shock, and all they knew was that I had been put up for adoption when I was born and fostered for four months before they adopted me.”

When Peter was 19, he married his wife, Linda, and his adoptive parents, Fred and Irene Knee, gave him his birth certificate, which said his name was actually Peter Young.

It also said his biological parents were a Greek woman named Maria Bratsi and an English man with the surname Young, who was also called Peter.

Peter then found out his parents had met in Israel when Maria had been travelling with her parents and Peter had been serving in the Army. Aged 16, Maria moved to England with Peter and the couple were married and lived in Hove.

He was also told that his paternal grandparents had been cruel to Maria. Three days after she had given birth to Peter, the authorities had believed she was unstable and had put Peter up for adoption.

Peter, 56, said: “While I knew sad, sketchy details about how I came to be adopted, there was still so much of the puzzle completely missing.”

When he was 30, Peter began receiving letters from his real father and the pair agreed to meet in Norfolk.

“We had a chat. He was a nice chap, but it was like meeting a stranger,” said Peter.

His father told him Maria had gone to live in Kos after giving birth to him.

Peter, a sports therapist, then tried to find Maria, but, despite many investigations, the trail went cold.

While on holiday in Kos, Peter spent time at town halls researching birth, marriage and death registers, but still could find no trace of his mother.

Then Peter’s friend Karen put him in touch with a Greek man, Nourhan Volaka, who took him to Greek radio station City 93, which broadcasts to about 10 islands near Kos.

Peter said: “I was interviewed by the DJ, Pavlos Pattis, who translated my words into Greek, and put a plea out for anyone with information about Maria Bratsi to get in touch.

“Unbelievably, within an hour, two people had phoned the studio to say my mother was alive and they knew where she was living. I could not believe it.”

Thanks to the generosity of people in Kos, the next day Peter was told an aeroplane would be flying him to Ikaria, the nearby island his mother lived on.

“I met my mother for the first time inside a small airport lounge. She greeted me with three red roses and a hug, and said she was as happy as she could ever be,” said Peter.

Maria told Peter she had been forced to give him up as a baby, and she had tried to contact him before, but her search had proved fruitless.